Guy's Cliffe House

The Heritage Open Weekend continues and we visited another site this morning, again choosing
one we hadn't been too before. I originally thought that Guy's Cliffe House, at Warwick,
was just a ruined building to look at but there was more on site, including a medieval church
which is now a masonic chapel, and various other pathways and passages to walk through.

Astley Castle

The Heritage Open Weekend is here again. The weekend actually started yesterday but we normally only go anywhere on the Saturday or Sunday. This time we actually went somewhere on the Friday.

Astley Castle near Nuneaton has recently been renovated and
turned into an expensive holiday home. The open weekend would probably be the only chance we would get to see inside so we thought we'd be silly to miss out.

Heritage Open Days 2012

For this years Heritage Open Days, we visited a few places in Coventry and Kenilworth, choosing
places we hadn't been to before. We went to a few places in Coventry on saturday.
Although we had been to Kenilworth quite a few times, we had
never actually been to Abbey Fields, so we went there on the sunday.

Charterhouse Open Day

The Charterhouse, the remains of a 14th century priory just outside Coventry city centre, was open
to the public today. The Charterhouse Preservation Trust is trying to find a use for the building
which keeps it available for the public. City College had tried to sell the building but when it was bequeathed to the city it was supposed to be used for public education. There is more info on the BBC News website from last year with an update from earlier this week.

2 Minute Silence

While we were in Asda they did the 2-minute silence over the shop tannoy, and I think everyone stood silently and observed it. It must have been strange for people coming into the shop and finding everyone standing silent and still, but fortunately nobody seemed to be confused by it. The only thing disturbing the silence was the self-checkout machines repeatedly asking for confirmation since the people checking out their shopping had temporarily stopped and the machines were getting confused by it.

Heritage Open Day 2011

We went to nearby Baginton for this years Heritage Open Day. Within a short distance
there were several sites, including the Electric Train Museum and Bagot's Castle, neither
of which are normally open to the public. We also visited Airbase, where they had
a selection of vintage aircraft on display.

Black Country Living Museum

We continued yesterday's theme of visiting somewhere new, this time we drove west to the
Black Country Living Museum. This is similar to Blists Hill at Ironbridge with
a similar range of displays and shops.

Llywernog Silver-Lead Mine

Some photos from the Llywernog Lead Mine near Aberystwyth. There are two parts to the tour: a self-guided part where you walk around reading the information boards, and a guided tour underground. The underground part was very wet but very intersting.

Birmingham Back to Backs

I was going to say that the Birmingham Back to Back houses were more interesting that I expected, but I didn't really know what to expect. The guided tour takes about an hour and you go through 4 different houses and one shop, decorated from different periods from the early 19th century through to the 1970s.

Walking from New Street station, we got to the houses much quicker than I was expecting. I recognised the stretch of Hurst Street but I didn't remember seeing the houses there before. I must have walked past them a dozen times without noticing them.

They were built when the surrounding area was still fields. None of the houses had running water - all the water had to come from the nearby 'Lady Well'. It isn't easy to imagine what the city was like back then but the short tour gave some interesting insights into the growth of the city.

Our only regret was that we missed out on visiting the sweet shop on the corner. It hadn't opened when we arrived, and was closed for lunch when we left.